Chapter 20 Leave the pieces
Lucas’s POV
I can feel my heart racing, as we flee from our assailants. I keep the positive thoughts flowing through my head, as we speed through the tight winding streets of Vulterra. We finally have everyone, and I don’t have to pretend to be part of that disgusting place ever again. I look over at Emmett, as we run through a narrow alley. Landon is still holding Blaine’s limp body in his arms, as we flee from the onslaught of many Vulturi members. We almost got out of there unnoticed.
We come to a small stream running between us, and the other side of the fault. I waste no time in jumping over the crack in the earth, but I whip around when I hear someone yelp in pain. Emmett is being held against his will, a stake pressed against his chest. Felix looks at me with those challenging crimson eyes, and presses the stake a little harder against Emmett’s beating heart. With my superhuman vision, I can see seven little beads of blood surface on his chest.
I try to keep my face expressionless because if Emmett is important to me, then they’ll kill him just in spite. At that moment, I hear our friends come from their hiding spots. I look around and see Edward holding Alec by the throat, and Bella holding a one-armed Jane. Just before the smile surfaces on my face a voice speaks out from across the fault. I turn to look, but there is a thick, unnatural fog rolling in, and I can barely see the others just yards away.
“Emmett Cullen, what a pleasure to see you again, and Landon you’ve come to this party bearing gifts?” Aro says in his silkiest voice. I feel a small shiver roll up my spine, as I struggle to keep my eyes on the one I love.
“Let them go Aro, you can take me.” Alice offers, from somewhere behind me.
“I have no interest in people whom I cannot trust Alice, regretfully I must decline your offer” he says, and I can hear the acid in his voice.
“Take me then. You can kill me for all I care, but let them go” I speak up, parting my dry lips, and speaking with the confidence that I don’t really have. My voice sounds too loud, too harsh in my own ears. What have I become? Aro’s laugh snaps me back to the present, and then something happens that I wasn’t expecting.
“No survivors” Aro shouts, and then everything goes into utter chaos. That’s when multiple people jump out of the fog.
Demetri is right there, and I have no time to move, so he lands right on top of me. I try to divert some of the impact by rolling, and it causes us both to roll off the edge of the shore. Water fills my lungs, while Demetri keeps his hold on me. I try to fight my way to the surface, but he’s way stronger than me. I know I won’t die permanently, if I drown, but I’ll be dead long enough to get staked, so I can’t drown. I stop fighting him, and reach for the stake on my belt. With one fluent thrust, I shove the stake right through his neck.
I leap up, and inhale a deep breath of sweet oxygen. When I look around I see that the fog has disappeared, and everyone is fighting viciously. Alex is standing just behind an empty building, and I can tell that she’s casting a spell. A man I know by the name of Augustus is running at her, so I intersect them. I kick him in the torso, as hard as I can, and he flies through the air. Freeing my other stake from the holster, I run after him, and just as he gets to his feet, I thrust the stake as hard as I can into his chest. He begins to desiccate immediately, falling to the ground Augustus is no more.
I turn just in time to see it. Aro is standing over Alice, his hand knitted in her hair. She’s struggling to regain her footing, but it’s too late. Aro pulls a stake from his long, billowing robes, and raises it above his head, then with the speed of a vampire, he brings it down on her. Before she is staked, I’m tackled to the ground by someone. When I look up, I see that it’s Demetri I reach up, and snap his neck. With just a little force, his head comes completely off his shoulders, and I toss it across the battlefield.
I jump to my feet, and look over where Aro was standing, and anger bubbles within me. Alice is hunched over on her side, unmoving. Beside her, also lying still is Jasper. I rush across the field, but before I can reach them, a shrill scream fills the air. I look back, and see Emmett standing ove Alec, his body engulfed in flames. After mere seconds, the screams stop, and I look around. Alex is still chanting, and every member of the Vulturi has disappeared.
“Go, they have been transported to a place far enough away that you can escape. You have to go now” she shouts, as we all look over at Alice and Jasper. “I transported everyone without a heartbeat. The old type of vampire, and the dead. I’m sorry, now let’s go” she says, with a somewhat more tender voice. I walk alongside Emmett, but we’re all silent. Jasper and Alice are dead, and even though we’re alive nobody wants to celebrate. We won, for now but our sacrifice is that we have to leave the pieces, behind. We must let go of those we lost, but that’s impossible.
Chloe’s POV
I feel cold. That’s weird, it never gets cold in Jackson’s room. Usually I have to sleep without the blanket because of how warm it gets. I’m in that space between sleep, and awareness. I can’t move yet, but I’ll do it, when I wake up. I try to hold onto the dream that I just had. Wait, what was it about again? I try to think about the dream, but as I think harder, it runs faster away from me. I shiver from the cold, and that’s when my muscles begin to stir. My eyelids flutter open.
The room is completely dark, and I can’t see anything through thick blanket of darkness. Rolling over, I reach for the blanket, but all I feel is straw. I sit straight up in bed, and feel all around. I’m sitting on a bed of straw, Jackson is right beside me, and I have no idea where I am. I frantically put my feet on the ground, and I can feel the cold dirt between my toes. What the hell is going on? Where am I? Where is Jackson? Fear begins to creep in my stomach, and I feel sick.
I stumble through the darkness, and eventually I find something that will help. A light switch. I flip it on, and look around. I’m in a large room, with a very high ceiling. Looking around at the interior, it looks like I’m in a barn. I look over to the bed, where I was laying and see that there is someone laying on the ground beside it. I take a few steps closer, and look down at the unmoving man before me. I recognize him. He killed my brother. He was Rosalie’s mate. It’s Klaus.
I hurriedly back away from him, and find myself against the wall. How did I get here? Am I dead? I watched Emmett rip his heart out, and grind it to pieces in his hand. Where the hell is Jackson? That’s when Klaus raises his head, and looks blearily up at me. For a moment, we look into each other’s eyes, and then we both promptly look down at the dirt floor.
“Where are we?” I mumble, and he looks around with confusion.
“I haven’t a clue.” He says. I slide down to the floor, and begin to sob. Just when I thought that life was finally behind me, it comes right back to bite me in the ass. I love my brother with all my heart, but damn him for whatever he did to put me in this situation. I can feel Klaus staring at me, and for some reason he’s just as lost as I am. How did this happen? Where is Jackson, is he okay? Am I going to die? I ponder these thoughts, while sobbing in a musty barn with a murderous vampire quietly sitting before me. What has my life become?
